c17h19no3 | [ MAD MAX AU : EYEPATCH DISASTER ]

[ MAD MAX AU : EYEPATCH DISASTER ]

The others tell him that he's shortening his already-dwindling stock of life, blowing fumes into his pipe instead of out. But the way Pip sees it, he's no different from the machines, those beautiful disasters made of mangled parts that growl with gasoline, drinks noxious fuel that churns in the heat of chrome and breathes wisps of toxins into the sky. Cigarettes are similar to that. Familiar. Cigarettes kill slowly, and Pip is fine with it, the way the War Boys are fine with drawing patterns on their corroding skin and naming their diseases with innocuous names. Hello, Tim. Hello, Greg.

Pip names his 4 disease sticks after names of people he doesn't know, and treads through sand and dust to find the only other person in this wasteland that's as stupid as he is. His journey takes him past a few old faces that look up from their aimless tasks, sifting through nothing for something, and they greet him with his given nickname— Goose— which Pip responds to with a crooked grin and an exaggerated sigh.

(it's the only thing he knows about the concept of family, that his father and his grandfather and great-grandfather were always part of the shitstorm that brought them closer and closer to hell: a long line of idiots called the Wild Geese, happily trading in their blood for gold. the grapevine's informed Pip of how his grandfather and the generation before that one died with a smile on their faces during the Big One that eventually laid waste to humanity, but if Pip ever resented the nickname that stuck with him like a bad reminder of his family's foibles, he doesn't think about it anymore.

he doesn't even know what a goose looks like. he can hardly be offended.)

Squinting his one eye against the sun, he maneuvers through dunes and dilapidation until he finds his target: a jarringly bright shock of red in a world already saturated in oranges and yellows. Badou is blindingly obvious even when he tries to be discreet.

Pip likes that about the kid.

"Hey, Badou. Got my hands on a few friends today, how 'bout it?"

He holds up one hand, tired cigarettes held between fingers in makeshift bearclaws.

"What've you got to barter for 'em, huh?"

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Slam. Years of being pummeled by this hotheaded ginger should've prepared him for any and all assaults, but the knuckles land and pitch the merc back against his side of the car, thick skull and all.

And people why he keeps that stupid bandage over his nose at all times— maybe if he weren't getting assaulted all the time, he wouldn't have to.

(War wounds worth flaunting.)

"Merde, watch the face. Your never-ending crusade to make me less attractive, I swear..."

Nursing his shitty mug, Pip finds a perch for his chin on the steering wheel, single eye trained in front of him and on the horizon, where he can see the curls of smoke cutting embers into a disarmingly clear sky.

"Truce?"

Ah, yes, now that sound, the familiar music of Pip's head colliding with something of equal hardness but not value....that is satisfying. So satisfying Badou could almost use a cigarette.....

But dammit, he has to ration the last one or take the other two off Pip's dead body. One green eye slides over to Pip, considering.

"Nah, better not feed him a poisonous IBS lizard and take 'em...." Is what he mutters to himself. And, instead of offering his hand like a real man or something, Badou snorts.

"Yeah, fine, truce. At least until I break your nose again~"

It's going to be a long drive.

"I heard that," is the exasperated reply, followed by a light swat to the side of Badou's head—

—and that's that, the push and pull, the polarity that has the two hit each other thanks to their opposing magnetism. The impact of their collision, always bound to leave a few bruises. Pip laughs despite the abuse his head's received in the past few minutes, starts up the engines again and feigns mischievous innocence.

The car rumbles a warning: 'no more fucking monkey business while you're in here', she says.

Pip whistles a tune, under his breath.

And then, lightning-fast— or, well, at least he thinks so— he leans over in his seat, cranes his neck, and tries to plant a big ol' gross dad smooch to the side of Badou's head, where he'd just smacked him.

Badou's preoccupied with being a grumbly baby so he doesn't see the attack coming. Just feels gross, chapped lips press into his hand where it blocks his head and immediately whips around to peer at his "father" figure in mute horror.

And then he's clattering back against the window, braced against it and puffed up like a goddamn kitten trying to defend itself, an orange puff ball all grown up.

"WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT FOR, YOU FRUIT?! JUST CAUSE YOU TRIED TO SET ME UP BEFORE DON'T MEAN I'M SAVING MYSELF FOR YOU YA SICK FUCK!"

Ah, yes, have a foot planted in your shoulder, Pip, keeping you away from the screaming ginger in question. He furiously scrubs his hand against a worn pantleg until his skin comes away red.

Alright, now he's just wasting gas with the car on idle. Not that he's feeling too much grief over the loss of resources, given that Gastown is within view (albeit most of it is just the smog that the place gives off).

The screaming is music to his ears, and even the foot digging a groove into his shoulder is a good reminder that the kid balks at any sign of (disgusting) big-brotherly affection; Badou doesn't show his hand so readily all the time, but this, this is him at his most transparent.

Pip's crooked one-eyed grin spells trouble.

"Haven't you ever heard the phrase 'kiss and make up'? C'mere, you goddamn mongrel."

Big arms swoop in like vulture wings, wrap themselves around the leg extended towards him to ensnare it in an awkward bearhug. Enjoy how this manchild rubs his forehead against your knee, Badou, this is the semi-guardian figure you've assigned yourself to.

"GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM ME YOU WEASEL! I'M GONNA CHOP YOU INTO A GODDAMN MEAT PIE FOR THOSE SCAVENGERS! FUCK OOOOFFF!"

Badou's apparently a really flexible guy, judging by the way he's arching away from Pip's grip, knee shoved into his mouth and trying to aggressively knee his fucking nose off, his spine might be like, triple jointed.

His face is red, his blood pressure has skyrocketed, and this day just keeps getting better. A scarred palm smooshes Pip's cheek, shoving him away as much as he can with that power behind that scrawny ass arm.

"What the fuck is wrong with you!? Are you high? WERE THERE DRUGS IN THOSE CIGS? WERE YOU TRYING TO DRUG ME, YOU DICK CHEESE?!"

That's the only reason he can think Pip wou- well, no. Pip's a fucking asshole. That's all the reason he really needs to get on Badou's very last nerve. It's just, the info broker expected a very different set of retaliation for that little play.

Badou's got claws and fangs, and the best way to combat a mountain of thorns is by being as pliant as humanly possible: survival tactics that Pip's never had to employ until now. Killing with kindness isn't his forte, but being affectionate... well. He's always been told that of all the scraggly Bernadottes that've found it prudent to unleash themselves upon this godless world, he's most likely the softest.

(Laughable.)

Canines snap languidly at the palm forcing his head back and away, a motion in stark contrast to the way his skull yells at him for mercy. He may walks away from this with permanent brain damage. He already has permanent brain damage.

A last headrub against hand and knee, and Pip straightens up to aggressively, invasively pinch Badou's cheek.

Cute kid.

"Ah, aren't they working? The affection drug? Pretty soon you're going to be feeling all soft and mushy inside, and I'll be here to 'witness' you."

And he smiles his jackass grin, an expression he's perfected over the ages.

Badou has no idea what that is. Killing with kindness, what the fuck? Acting like you give a damn? Even after all these years of sticking together out of some odd sense of necessity, even after the years under his belt and beneath his nails like dirt, he still doesn't get it.

It must be Pip's brain damage. He has a thing about it. It's like a fetish.

Swatting the offending hand away, Badou wrenches over to clip Pip's chin with a little uppercut that hopefully won't make him bite off his tongue. There's definite heat smoldering in that single green eye that's fixed on the elder eyepatch fuck.

"What is that, your new fetish? First it was dirt around your peehole and now this...'m almost bout to get the other boys on you, man. They're getting worried."

And then he folds his arms over his chest (like a cross in the grave) and huffs, a little heat gone. "You won't get to witness me. I'll witness you. I'm not going down like him."

Sometimes his men call it a crutch, one that's worse than a single eye or a torn limb: a propensity towards caring, how about that? Pip'll live caring, he'll die caring. He's looking forward to it, in the same way the War Boys cicatrize their skin to make a gravestone on their own bodies. 'I was here, this was me'.

This might not have been the best time to use their words, though— witness me. It's amazing how death remains a sticky subject even when it's available wholesale. A commodity as common as sand but somehow still difficult to stomach. Also like sand.

Pip wonders whose ashes he's biting right now. He grins through it.

"Damn right you're gonna witness me. You're gonna be the one telling stories about me long after you stop using my braid as a ceremonial trinket. 'Pip Bernadotte was the most handsome man this side of the desert. Even his farts were music to my ears'."

Crutches are easy to trip over, easy to use as weapons barbed and pointed, easy to be yanked out like eyeballs. Badou's still of the thought process that it's better to have parts stitched back in. Hurts like a bitch but at least there's less missing.

(he doesn't want to witness him)

"What makes you think I won't turn away at the last second? That I won't piss on your grave and leave it at that. Your farts sound like a banshee, by the way, fuck you."

(but he knows he won't; he'll burn the image of Pip into his remaining retina until the end of days)

Whoever says that mercenaries don't hope are wrong: they do, because they find the futility as amusing as they do their own foibles, their own stupidity. Pip hopes against hope that when he bites the bullet, Badou will know how to lash out instead of lash in, reach for someone else to sit back and watch the stars with.

He wants to hope, he wants to know that the kid'll be alright.

But that's that and this is this, and banged and bruised limbs clang to reposition themselves in his perch, to reach for the steering wheel so they can inch the fuck out of this bunker. Gas town, ahoy.

"Watch your mouth— I didn't raise you to have such bad manners, gamin."

The tone here is overly theatrical, patronizing with an edge of that prevailing affection. Possibly even more annoying than sarcasm.

Alright? As far as Badou's concerned, he's always alright. That's what he'll tell them, when they ask. 'That idiot? He's as good as dead. I don't need him, anyway.'

(like clockwork, like a mechanism that makes each individual tick click, as right as rain...shoulders hunched and tight, mouth pinched and trying not to cave over, how is he supposed to--)

Steeling himself as steely as a V-8, an elbow jostles out to bump into Pip's side as he arranges himself comfortably against the window once more.

"You didn't raise me at all, shithead. If anything, I raised you. Can hardly sew your own underwear either..."

But there's a hint of fondness underneath the underneath. And not for the underwear. At least they're getting somewhere, at least the anticipation builds as the endless sand opens out before them.

He laughs about Badou's statement, the mothering that Ginger Jr. gets himself into, because it's so apt— for someone who fights tooth and nail to keep himself afloat, there are bits of him that veer dangerously close to busybody territory.

It's cute.

"What if I told you I keep making holes in them just to watch you suffer through patching them up, huh?"

Because the fun of it— not specifically underwear patching, no one needs to suffer through that— is making Badou do pedestrian things, watching him fumble through normalcy.

The smell of Gastown starts settling through open windows, hot and heavy. High-octane smog that people have to squint through, that familiar burn: it's a wonder how the inhabitants haven't corroded down to bones by now.

Instead of opting to answer, Badou shoves at one of those broad shoulders with the heel of his palm again, until Pip meets window. Again.

"What if I told you I'm gonna turn you into a pair of undies. I ain't gonna wear 'em, but I'll make sure the ol' Immortan gets 'em as tribute," he snarls right back. He levels his foot, shoved into Pip's hip, for good measure, too. Keep to your side, bozo. That sort of thing.

The smell of the octane is one of the sweetest smells around, the burn of it coats his lungs as well as any old tar from this world or the last one. The sweeter scent is that of gunfire but that's how it goes. There are already similar pilgrimages making their way towards the town, and its easy enough to weave through them until it really starts to get congested.

"What, sucking up to the Big Guy? I'm not gonna say that that's not smart."

Badou might actually get a reward for turning in a thorn in Immortan's side, even if Pip's not important enough to get on anyone's radar— yet. It's mostly a jest, though, because no matter how resourceful Badou can be, there are some things that Badou can be relied upon Not To Do. Like turning Pip into a skin coat.

It's the same old song and dance of having to wrestle your way through the rabble for a drop of anything: water, oil, freedom. Refugees with re-purposed machines that haven't been confiscated yet, the lucky few who've managed to get somewhere within range of the city before their engines gave out. Pip rolls by a sunburnt party of three who look enviously at the mercenary during their endeavors to physically push their car along the dirt road; all of them too stubborn to wait until the sun sets.

A middle finger reaches out of the rolled-down car window, a practiced (and practical) reply to a competitor honking at Pip for cutting in front of him.

"You snooze, you lose!"

A snort.

"That'd be like sucking up to God. Whichever ones still peek down here on occasion when they've gotta wipe their asses," his tone is a little more subdued (never guilty) as he gives Pip a furtive glance over.

Badou worries less about the ones like that, like them, shit out of luck when the sun's high in the sky only to scrape by thanks to the dirt of their elbows and their spit than he worries about the ones who find their purpose in getting high off the radiation that continues to crackle across the atmosphere years after the world ended.

That is to say, he ain't got time for that.

"You don't haveta taunt em, you know. It's bad karma."

Yes, let Badou sound like the bigger man for once. And then another glance to the side.

"Unless it's that asshole from last week, then he can jack off with rocks for all I care."

"Which asshole from last week? I swear, there are too many asses to keep track of."

'Including yours' is left unsaid. That comment about Immortan Joe is a little smudge in the corner of Pip's mind, though— he hasn't really ever sat down and asked the kid about what he thinks of all that, if there might ever have been a time, when. Well. You know.

Going out in a blaze of glory, though; he's not sure if Badou would ever have found that as romantic as it's sold to be.

Fingers tap a steady beat that wafts, inaudible, from half-broken speakers. He's just recalling 'Wild Horses' again, humming it under his breath. His singing skills need work.

"The one that tried to cut my hair...said he was gonna sell it, but I'm pretty sure he was gonna jack it."

Obviously the thought doesn't sit well with Badou, who's arms cross even tighter around his chest. He doesn't like the thought of this; Pip's life span or his own, bartering lives for survival-- the works. Nothing's romantic about it, because going for broke just gets you fucked up. Even now.

At least Pip has focused on that subject and naught else. He'd take the noise that grates along his eardrums over that.

A shudder, in response. Some people really are that desperate.

"Jack it, or jack to it. You're gonna have to start wearing a paper bag over your head— am I going to have to worry about you?"

Like a father worrying about his son's first date... except it's nothing so glamorous, in this case. He raises a brow under the brim of his hat, makes another motion out of the window for the guy in front of him to get a damn move on.

Pip is lucky enough to not only get the bitchiest look from his charge, but a kick from a dusty boot for starters. He's really considering throwing your ass out the door, Pip.

"What about your hair, Pippy Long Shitter? You've got more than me, they'll want your dusty locks more than mine. Think about 'em wrapping the end of it around their wieners," though it's disgusting and he tastes puke in his mouth, Badou's smirk is triumphant. Asshole-y. Victorious.

How indecent, Badou. Pip pulls a face, the kind that conveys true disgust and maybe even a smidge of defeat, before he falls right back into the routine and takes a hand off the wheel to hide...

...his nipples. Don't question this strategic move.

"So you were looking at me like that, huh...?! That's the kind of thing you think about when you look at your old man? I'm not a piece of goddamn meat..."

Singsong, he accelerates through a sliver of space between two cars, to a cacophony of horns.

Badou stares at him blankly. It's almost tranquil, this moment of peace within the usually warring mind. Everything is quiet, even the bitching lobe of his brain.

And then he reaches out to pinch his fingers over Pip's nostrils, in serious contemplation of putting a palm over his mouth.

"No one but sick fucks who don't know tasteful merch would think that about your dusty flat ass. They ain't seen what it looks like all gunked up."

If malls still existed, Pip would be the bane of the parking lot's existence.

Pip has to crane his neck over the sudden pinching of his nose, mouth opened like a dog under hot summer sun while he tries not to crash their car against an incoming truck. When he finally musters the concentration to speak, his voice does resemble a nasal bark. If he isn't careful, he'll choke on his own tongue.

"When the hell did you see my ass gunked up?! You always act like you're so uninterested in this ass, and then you come up with shit like that... where did I go wrong, mon Dieu."

An exaggerated stream of French expletives here, and one dusty palm settles on Badou's hair, patting in a consoling fashion— for what reason, who knows. He just wants an excuse.

Gastown looms into view, uncompromising, with spires of fire occasionally launching from charred turrets that rise into ash. Mordor mk. II.

Well, that does it. Badou explodes, taking out the hemisphere with him. Flash to the end of the world and kangaroos as we know it.
Flash forward to the real scenario: Badou twists the tip of Pip's nose to a painful angle, ducks the consoling palm, teeth gnashed together as he screams,

"I DIDN'T WANT TO SEE YOUR STUPID TAN ASS! I SAW IT WHEN I HAD TO GET THE BULLET OUT AND YOU SAID IT WAS TOO DAMN GAY FOR FRANCIS TO GET IT OUT! DO YOU FUCKIN REMEMBER THAT, BECAUSE I DO!"

This is one of his many traumas, including that time he was almost boiled into soup. Gangly young limbs are precious in these parts.

Thankfully they're here. There's, surprise surprise, gas in the air. And its almost a soothing scent.

Wow Badou?! Warn a guy before you do that?! Pip's hand skitters over the wheel, taking the tires with him to nearly pitch their ride into oncoming traffic. Thankfully, it's years of survival skills that allows him to rev out of the way, just in time.

"WATCH IT, YOU LITTLE SHIT! AND FRANCIS WAS BEING GAY AS HELL THAT ONE TIME TOO, YOU CAN'T BLAME A GUY FOR BEING CAREFUL!"

Poor Francis, who only offered to 'look at the Captain's ass' because he was worried that he'd have to cut a cheek off and he wasn't qualified for that kind of surgery... he still tries to defend himself whenever this story comes up.

But fuck it, they're in the city proper and Pip can finally park the both of them in a discreet spot on the outskirts. Wrenching his face out of Badou's grip, he rubs his nose and grumbles to himself in fast-paced French.

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I AM SCREAMING

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...this is so stupid but some day can we thread that?! baby badou and almost being boiled? + ass

HOW DARE U SAY IT'S STUPID...OF COURSE WE CAN NERD BUG ME ALWAYS